Friday, July 25, 2008

A few weeks ago I started The Pantry Plan, where I decided I would not buy groceries, with a few exceptions like cat food and dairy products, until September. Instead, I would be living off the items I already had in my pantry and my fridge/freezer.

Presto Pasta Nights plays very nicely with The Pantry Plan because, like so many people, I always have a good quantity of pasta on hand. Pasta can pair with most anything else I have on hand as well; like these new healthy versions of ramen noodles, called Choice Ramen.

Unlike the standard version of ramen noodles, these are not fried and the seasoning packet has 25% less sodium than the regular version; nice because most ramen noodle seasoning packets have over 1,000mg of sodium per serving or half the daily recommended amount!

I've been pretty incapacitated these past two weeks with a back injury. So, meals that don't take a lot of time or require me to stand for long periods of time are right up my alley. I'm also a big fan of jazzing up my ramen noodles when I make them.

This time, I used some frozen pre-cooked chicken chunks and a handful of frozen mixed veggies from my freezer and tossed it all together during the last three minutes of the noodles cooking. To top off the dish, I added 1/3 cup of shredded cheese on top.

Grand total cooking time was 6 minutes. Total amount spent on meal was approximately $2.32. How did it taste? It was delicious. I didn't miss the extra salt and it was a welcome change from the cold cereal I've been eating for most meals the past two weeks.

Everything about this meal fit the bill of healthy, quick, and filling.